Not to be an alarmist, but the four horsemen of the apocalypse are charging on the horizon–– riding evil angry pigs to deliver a death sentence to the entire human race! You included!!!!!

Yes, this year’s model of doom and gloom is the Swine Flu (H1N1), an oldie but goodie from the 70’s, has evolved and come back to tickle your nostalgia bone and send you to the boneyard toot sweet. How can you tell if you have this new and improved Swine Flu? Look for these telltale signs:

1. Your pig is achy and feels hot when you kiss its cheeks nightie-night-night

2. Piggie is not sleeping well and the bedroom floor is littered with spent Kleenex

3. Your pig is listless and its tail loses its natural bouncy curl

4. Poor porky requests chicken soup by the gallon

5. Your pig says it “feels like something the cat dragged home” and misses work wallowing in its own filth

Once your pig is sick, you can get infected also.

In order to protect oneself from Swine Flu, some people get all Lady MacBeth; washing their hands incessantly. Others play doctor and wear a mask over mouth and nose below their furrowed brows. And fear-filled fanatics hold their breaths in public and refuse to shake hands with anyone. Instead, they greet filthy, germ-ridden people with a cheery spray of gunfire, an action generally thought by etiquette experts to be not quite as cordial a greeting as a hearty handshake.

Even though there have only been isolated cases of the Swine Flu reported worldwide, there is a full-on pandemic panic fueled by a flood of fear-mongering news reports. You’ve seen and heard the ‘bumpers’ on news shows before breaking for commercials:

“Is your skin trying to kill you? We’ll tell you the disturbing answer of one large organ’s evil revenge after the break…”

“Is certain death the least of your worries after contracting Swine Flu? Stay tuned and find out how one expert says Swine Flu can affect you in the afterlife… then Chip will tell us in his three day forecast if it’s going to be good weather for cemetery plot shopping .”

“We all know the dangers of Swine Flu, but you probably don’t know that two common household items could kill you quicker and more painfully. We’ll tell you which ones when we come back.”

You wait on pins and needles to discover that washing down fistfuls of Drano with a half gallon of bleach makes Swine Flu look like a warm hug and a wet kiss.

Woe is we.

It’s gotten so bad that The National Pork Producers Association is demanding that Swine Flu be renamed “The Delicious, Nutritious And Surprisingly Versatile Other White Meat Sniffles”.

Medical officials at the Centers For Disease Control And Prevention in Atlanta have not returned phone calls to comment on this new name.